The 20 to 30 year ocean temperature cycles turned back to warm from the late 1970s until the late 1990s, which is the primary reason that global temperatures warmed during this period. But that warming ended 15 years ago, and global temperatures have stopped increasing since then, if not actually cooled, even though global CO2 emissions have soared over this period. As The Economist magazine reported in March, “The world added roughly 100 billion tonnes of carbon to the atmosphere between 2000 and 2010. That is about a quarter of all the CO2 put there by humanity since 1750.” Yet, still no warming during that time. That is because the CO2 greenhouse effect is weak and marginal compared to natural causes of global temperature changes.

At first the current stall out of global warming was due to the ocean cycles turning back to cold. But something much more ominous has developed over this period. Sunspots run in 11 year short term cycles, with longer cyclical trends of 90 and even 200 years. The number of sunspots declined substantially in the last 11 year cycle, after flattening out over the previous 20 years. But in the current cycle, sunspot activity has collapsed. NASA’s Science News report for January 8, 2013 states,

“Indeed, the sun could be on the threshold of a mini-Maunder event right now. Ongoing Solar Cycle 24 [the current short term 11 year cycle] is the weakest in more than 50 years. Moreover, there is (controversial) evidence of a long-term weakening trend in the magnetic field strength of sunspots. Matt Penn and William Livingston of the National Solar Observatory predict that by the time Solar Cycle 25 arrives, magnetic fields on the sun will be so weak that few if any sunspots will be formed. Independent lines of research involving helioseismology and surface polar fields tend to support their conclusion.”

That is even more significant because NASA’s climate science has been controlled for years by global warming hysteric James Hansen, who recently announced his retirement.

[I]t is not only the Met Office that has claimed that the increase in global temperatures is statistically significant: the IPCC has as well. Moreover, the IPCC used the same statistical model as the Met Office, in its most-recent Assessment Report (2007). The Assessment Report discusses the choice of model in Volume I, Appendix 3.A. The Appendix correctly acknowledges that, concerning statistical significance, “the results depend on the statistical model used”.

What justification does the Appendix give for choosing the trending autoregressive model? None. In other words, the model used by the IPCC is just adopted by proclamation. Science is supposed to be based on evidence and logic. The failure of the IPCC to present any evidence or logic to support its choice of model is a serious violation of basic scientific principles — indeed, it means that what the IPCC has done is not science.

To conclude, the primary basis for global-warming alarmism is unfounded. The Met Office has been making false claims about the significance of climatic changes to Parliament—as well as to the government, the media, and others — claims which have seriously affected both policies and opinions. When questioned about those claims in Parliament, the Met Office did everything feasible to avoid telling the truth.

The idea of building a vast industrial infrastructure to offset the effects of another vast industrial infrastructure (instead of shifting to renewable energy) only highlights our unwillingness to confront the deeper causes of global warming — the power of the fossil-fuel lobby and the reluctance of wealthy consumers to make even small sacrifices.

Even so, greater anxieties arise from those geoengineering technologies designed to intervene in the functioning of the earth system as a whole. They include ocean iron fertilization and sulfate aerosol spraying, each of which now has a scientific-commercial constituency.

How confident can we be, even after research and testing, that the chosen technology will work as planned? After all, ocean fertilization — spreading iron slurry across the seas to persuade them to soak up more carbon dioxide — means changing the chemical composition and biological functioning of the oceans. In the process it will interfere with marine ecosystems and affect cloud formation in ways we barely understand.

Enveloping the earth with a layer of sulfate particles would cool the planet by regulating the amount of solar radiation reaching the earth’s surface. One group of scientists is urging its deployment over the melting Arctic now.

Incidentally, as we’ve noted before, the idea of launching pollution into the upper atmosphere was an idea floated by John Holdren, the Obama’s administration’s Dr. Strangelove-esque resident “science” “czar” during the heady tulip mania-like early days of the administration, when all forms of totalitarianism seemed possible. Even Al Gore thinks those who propose such fantasies are “completely nuts.” And when Al Gore calls your risky anti-global warming scheme nuts, it’s pretty far out there in cloud (seeding) kookoo land:

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Oh, and regarding Al, his transition from hectoring busybody (relatively) conservative southern Democrat senator to hectoring busybody far left global warming totalitarian was very publicly announced with Earth in the Balance and an accompanying New York Times op-ed in 1989 titled “An Ecological Kristallnacht.” Ever since, global warming zealots have smeared anyone who questions their risky cap and tax schemes (to use Gore-approved language) as de facto Holocaust deniers. But as Aleister of the American Glob writes, “‘Climate Change Denier’ Is An Offensive Term And Liberals Should Stop Using It:”

Liberals used to call it Global Warming but like everything else in liberal politics, the words were studied, focus grouped and changed.

What used to be called Global Warming is now called Climate Change. Fine. Liberals are entitled to free speech under our constitution just like everyone else and no one would deny them that.

However, a new term is creeping up on the political horizon and it’s patently offensive.

Climate Change Deniers.

The implication is obvious, anyone who disagrees with liberals about the environment is denying an absolute truth.

The word “denier” has only one more infamous usage in this way.

Holocaust deniers.

People who deny that the Holocaust occurred or who argue that it wasn’t as horrific as reported are despicable. The Holocaust happened and it was horrific. Millions of people were systematically murdered.

To attach the word “denier” to climate change implies that anyone who disagrees with liberals on this issue are as evil as Holocaust deniers whether liberals intended it to or not.

Aleister spots whoever ghostwrites Barack Obama’s tweets calling the president’s opponents “climate deniers.” But here’s the thing; if you’re insinuating that global warming is the equivalent of the Holocaust, then you’ve just called yourself a Holocaust denier — for two reasons:

First, six million Jews were systematically murdered during the Holocaust. Unless there’s deliberately planned annihilation on a similar scale by other regimes (such as the horrors of the Soviet Union or under Mao), any comparisons to this singularly evil moment in man’s history cheapens it.

And second: If you really do believe in your heart of hearts that global warming is the equivalent of the Holocaust, then you’re under a personal moral obligation to do everything in your power to end such evils. How does CBS anchorman Scott Pelley in one breath compare global warming skeptics to ‘Holocaust deniers’ and say, “If I do an interview with Elie Wiesel, am I required as a journalist to find a Holocaust denier?” And then go on to cheerifully accept a seven figure annual salary from a network that dispatches journalists and camera crews all over the world via cars and jet aircraft, making the money it doles out to its on-air talent such as Pelley by those who produce goods which also pollute, and spends 22 hours a day beaming frivolous game shows, sitcoms and crime dramas into the hinterlands? (Causing further pollution by those who expend energy to power their TV sets.) Doesn’t he have a moral obligation to either convince his bosses to massively scale down their consumption — or quit, since he’s tacitly admitting that he’s prominent bureaucrat furthering his self-described Holocaust?

The Khmer Rouge sought to start over at year zero, and to sort of create the kind of society that very civilized, humane greens write about as though it were an ideal. I mean, people who would never consider genocide. But I argue that if you want to know what that would take, look at Cambodia: to empty the cities and turn everyone into peasants again. Even in a less developed country, let alone in someplace like the United States, that these sort of static utopian fantasies are just that.

But if you truly believe that global warming is the equivalent of the Holocaust, isn’t that your ultimate end game?

"If you know that animals are being inhumanely treated and that disease-ridden animals are processed along with healthy ones, don't you have a moral obligation NOT to eat meat?"

"If you believe that Jesus Christ is the only way to salvation and that those who refuse to believe are going to spend eternity in Hell, don't you have a moral obligation to evangelize everyone you meet, as often as humanly possible?"

"If you know that there are private-sector companies that profited from the Iraq war, don't you have a moral obligation to oppose that war?"

I have had people say each of these things to me. This sort of moral absolutism is its own special form of tyranny.

Of course that's not to say that we can't use this form of argumentation with our liberal friends...hoist them by their own petard, as it were:

"If you know that IRS has been targeting conservative groups, don't you have a moral obligation to oppose this practice openly and vociferously, instead of trying to make excuses for it or pretend like it's not a problem? After all, if the shoe were on the other foot, you'd be livid, right?"

Abortion may be murder (see Gosnell, Kermit), but climate change isn’t the Holocaust or Holomodor or the Cultural Revolution, and those who claim it is should be letting their enemies blood flow freely. They aren’t (well, a few are), showing themselves to be, at minimum, liars.

OTOH, I’m glad that Al-Gore hasn’t become the USSA’s Green Mussolini. (“I’ll believe its a crisis when he acts as if it’s a crisis.”)